Posts from the ‘silhouettes’ Category

MORNINGS ON THE “AMERICAN SERENGETI”
For three consecutive mornings, after waking before dawn, cooking up some oatmeal and toasted bagels, and warming our fingers over the car defroster, Ryan and I hiked a half mile (3/4 mile?) in to a valley that was teeming with wildlife. Hundreds of Elk, dozens of Bison, Pronghorn, and Mule Deer grazed the nearly nonexistent grass, moving slowly but surely across the floor of the valley. Despite “bear activity” signs, we felt very safe as we could see for miles in almost all directions.
Here (thanks to a tip from a wildlife photographer friend) we found a “bachelor herd” of Bighorn Sheep (Ovis canadensis).
In our many previous trips, we’d mainly seen bands of Bighorn ewes and lambs scrambling on the very vertical hillsides along the road from Gardiner, MT to Mammoth in the park. A few times we’d seen smaller rams come down to the river to drink, but never a big bachelor herd. But in this Valley of the American Serengeti (our name) we found a couple dozen “big boys” and another dozen young rams. You see Bighorn males and females only intermingle during the late November rut and mating season. After that, they go their own ways. Young males will join the bachelor herd after a year with mom.The Patriarch
Though Bighorns don’t have a single band leader, they do seem to jostle a bit for social status, at least it seemed like that to us. This scarred full-curl ram seemed to be the oldest and the ram with the largest horns. His short muzzle had what appeared to be a scar all the way across the bridge. You can age a ram by its horns due to “growth rings” but I’m not experienced enough to attempt it. Their horns can weigh up to 30 pounds! Rams can live 9-12 years.
[Canon 7D with Canon 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 IS II USM lens at 400mm; f6.3 at 1/1000 second; ISO 200; tripod]

Still Life with Bachelors
“Bachelors” is perhaps a misnomer as many of the older healthier rams may mate in the fall, but the all-male bands are called “bachelor herds.” I love the painterly feel to this image…Lots going on in this single frame. Note the young ram leaping over a laying ram. I muted the colors in Aperture.
[Canon 7D with Canon 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 IS II USM lens at 400mm; f5.6 at 1/1250 second; ISO 400; +0.33ev; tripod]

Two become One
Just a “haccident” (happy accident) when the two rams lined up to form “one head.” Blur your eyes a bit and …Bizarre.
[Canon 7D with Canon 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 IS II USM lens at 400mm; f7.1 at 1/1000 second; ISO 320; tripod]

Blue Bighorn Silhouette
A so-so shot that gets a bit of creative life by reducing the exposure by a few stops and altering the white balance.
[Canon 7D with Canon 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 IS II USM lens at 100mm; f8 at 1/125 second; ISO 100; tripod]

Monarch of the Mountains
Head on portrait of a full-curl ram. These boys not only tolerated us (can’t get closer than 25 yards due to Yellowstone’s rules (and common sense) but seemed to go about their business as if we weren’t even there. This is one of the real treats of Yellowstone; you get to witness the everyday lives of animals.
[Canon 7D with Canon 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 IS II USM lens at 400mm; f9 at 1/160 second; ISO 400; tripod]

Not sure if I like this image as a black and white or color version yet.
[Canon 7D with Canon 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 IS II USM lens at 148mm; f5 at 1/640 second; ISO 400; +0.33ev; tripod]

Still plenty of snow in the high country of Yellowstone in mid April. These Bighorns are extremely sure-footed and are at home in steep country. One of their main predators is the Mountain Lion, which is also at home in rugged terrain.
[Canon 7D with Canon 100-400mm f4.5-5.6 IS II USM lens at 400mm; f5.6 at 1/2500 second; ISO 160; -0.67ev; tripod]

I’m finally getting around to posting my favorite non-bird wildlife photos of 2015. This is as much an exercise in editing (and learning) for me, as it is sharing photos with you all. It’s always great fun to review the year’s adventures and try to whittle down the images. I give a far higher priority to photos that are a bit creative vs. a standard portrait in front light. I also tend to favor images that show some kind of animal behavior, such as the cooperative hunting between the Badger and Coyote. Enjoy! Ermine of the Bog

My parents and sister and family came up north to see the newly-completed Friends of Sax-Zim Bog Welcome Center where I am Executive Director. We had a nice visit on a cold February day and headed out on a tour of our lands. At the Friends’ Yellow-bellied Bog I saw something dash across the snow-covered road and I immediately recognized it as a winter-pelaged Short-tailed Weasel that we call Ermine. I quickly rolled the window down and started squeaking on my knuckle to attract its attention. This inquisitive guy made three lightning fast circles around our car, pausing only to look for the squeaking prey. He moved so fast that I only got a couple in focus, including this shot.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens; f5.6 at 1/4,000 second; ISO 250; handheld]
[Ermine (Short-tailed Weasel); Sax-Zim Bog, northern Minnesota]

Huntin’ Buddies
I chose this image more for its rarity. Cooperative hunting between Badgers and Coyotes is a rarely seen behavior, limited to areas where their ranges overlap and where Coyotes are not persecuted by man, in this case, Teddy Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. In this large Black-tailed Prairie Dog village, the Badger would go head first down a hole and try to dig the Prairie Dog out, the Coyote stood attentively nearby, hoping for the ‘dog’ to pop out another of its escape holes. Mammalogists have proven that the Coyote benefits from this partnership by catching more Prairie Dogs than if it was hunting solo. It is assumed that the Badger benefits too, as possibly the Coyote may chase an “escapee” back down its hole and into the jaws of the Badger.
[Coyote and Badger; Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota]

Backlit Bison

There is one easy thing that can really help your wildlife photography (that doesn’t involve expensive equipment!) and that is to GET IN THE FIELD EARLY! Dawn is the time when crepuscular critters may still be active and diurnal animals are also moving around. In summer, the mornings are cool and wildlife is more energized, much more so than during the heat of midday.

We found a heard of Bison backlit by the sun which was giving us gorgeous rim lighting on the coats of the Bison. Underexposing by several stops highlighted their breath on this chilly morning.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens; f5.6 at 1/8000 second; ISO 100; -3 ev; hand-held]
[Bison; Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota]

Horn of the Beast
I LOVE Bison! Can’t get enough of them. Every time I see a herd (in Yellowstone, Minnesota’s Blue Mounds State Park, Custer State Park in South Dakota, or here, in North Dakota’s Teddy Roosevelt National Park) it reminds me how close we (selfish and wasteful) humans came to wiping their millions off the face of the Earth. Plus, they are just MASSIVE beasts…beasts that let you get quite close. I love the texture of their hair/fur and the shape of the horn.
[Bison; Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota]

Pretty Kitty

Rarely do you get a chance to see, let alone photograph, a Bobcat in the daytime. But at a friends cabin in Carlton County, Minnesota last winter, I had that chance. After about 45 minutes of sitting quietly, it was an unbelievable thrill when Gene whispered, “Here she comes.” (We’ll call her “she” as her size seems small and features delicate…Plus, what a pretty face!). She cautiously slipped between the hazel brush, slinking her way towards the road-killed deer that Gene had provided. Sensing her surroundings with acute hearing and smell and vision, she crept closer, occasionally stopping to sit and relax, making sure the coast was clear. In the nearly 3 hours we sat there, she came in about four times, but retreating after a few minutes. I included three images of this rarely seen predator.

Sliver Hunt
I’ve been trying to do more “Animal-in-the-Landscape” images in the last few years…mainly using my Canon 70-200mm f4 lens. Ryan spotted this distant hunting Coyote and we could see that it was working its way to the sliver of light illuminating the ridge top. What I liked about this scene was the spotlight like light, and the Coyote stepped right into it.
[Coyote; Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota]

Fat and Happy
I included this mediocre photo because it just makes me smile. This Black-tailed Prairie Dog appears well fed and ready to hibernate!

Like many mammals that become more sedentary in winter, the Black-tailed Prairie Dogs try to put on a little fat for winter. This guys really accomplished his goal! These burrowing rodents are a blast to watch…And their “alarm” behavior is awesome; they stand upright and suddenly throw their paws straight up in the air and give a sharp “Yaah” call.

Pronghorn herd
Late in the day we headed overland and came upon yet another massive Prairie Dog town, but on the fringes was a cautious herd of Pronghorns. They were in deep shade but I kind of like the subtle colors that the lighting conditions brought out. Pronghorns are very hard to photograph on sunny days…The whites of their fur blow out.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens; f5.6 at 1/160 second; -2/3ev; ISO 400; tripod]
[Pronghorns; Teddy Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota]

Polyphemus
One of our Giant Silkworm Moths, the Polyphemus lives up to its name with a wingspan as wide as your outstretched hand…up to six inches across! This one was attracted to my garage lights and I carefully moved it in the morning to a more attractive background.
[Canon 7D with Canon 70-200mm f4; f8 at 1/250; ISO 1000; flash at -2 2/3 ev]
[Polyphemus Moth (Antheraea polyphemus); Skogstjarna, Carlton County, Minnesota]

Frosty Muley
It really helps to know how your camera sees versus how your eye sees. This pre-sunrise shot looked quite blah to my eye, but I knew the camera sees dawn shade as quite blue. I really like how the warm brown of the Muley contrasts with the cool blue frosty plants.
[Mule Deer; Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota]

Grandpa Marten
I was able to keep up with this American Marten (Pine Marten) as it hunted a logged area north of Ely, Minnesota. He/she loped along quite slowly and, that, combined with the very gray muzzle, led me to surmise that this was one old weasel!
[American (Pine) Marten; Echo Trail; Superior National Forest, Minnesota]

Porkie in Purple
April in to early May is the best time to see Porcupines in the North Woods. The Porkies seem giddy to get at the newly-sprouted catkins of willow and aspen. They relish these spring edibles and will crawl out on the most bendy branches to get at them. Sloth-like, they’ll reach out with their paws to pull inaccessible branches closer.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens; f8 at 1/250; ISO 800; tripod]
[Porcupine; Sax-Zim Bog, Minnesota]

Late for Dinner
A fun shot of a prairie dog doing what prairie dogs do all day long…going in and out of their underground tunnels. I strongly underexposed this image to highlight the rim lighting of this prairie dog against the setting sun. I didn’t plan that I’d get an image of one going down its hole, but I just kept shooting and this was actually my favorite.
[Black-tailed Prairie Dog; Teddy Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota]

Bridget specifically said “No frosty Bison photos! You have enough of them” But this one is a bit different. I converted the image to black and white then clipped the whites and blacks of the histogram to make a more high contrast image. It more accurately reflects what I remember from the Bison encounter than the original image. [Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/250, handheld]

I used a long exposure on these Harlequin Ducks to allow the river to blur nicely. But you have to take many photos as the ducks were constantly fidgeting.

[Canon 7D with Canon 85mm f1.2 lens, f1.2 at 1/2000, handheld]

The two images above were taken early in the morning between Mammoth and Tower Junction. You don’t always need the sun at your back! Backlighting can really be quite dramatic. I love how the rim light defines the elk’s shapes and makes the spring leaves pop. Also keep in mind that shadows often show as blue to our cameras and it contrasts nicely with the green leaves. [Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/640, -1EV, handheld]

Did you do a double take when you looked at this image? This is a reflection of a Bighorn ewe that I flipped 180 degrees. Have fun and experiment! [Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f6.3 at 1/1250, handheld]

Shapes often tell as much of a story as detailed subjects. I underexpeosed by nearly two stops to get this silhouette of Ryan hauling his 600mm f4 on a tripod across the snowy Hayden Valley. [Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/6400, -1 2/3 EV handheld]

Our wildlife subjects don’t always need to be large in the frame. But we really have to work to remember this and actually shoot “animal in the landscape” shots. Ryan and I had followed (by car) this sow and second-year cub for a while, but they cut up this steep hillside. I turned the camera vertical to emphasize the tall trees. Her backlit breath was a bonus. [Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/500, handheld]

I rented the Canon 85mm f1.2 lens for this trip specifically to play with extremely shallow depth of field in wildlife photography. This lens is commonly used in portrait photography to achieve very shallow DOF. This obliging Raven allowed me to get quite close and the result is a unique critter image with only an inch or two of in focus bird. [Canon 7D with Canon 85mm f1.2 lens, f1.2 at 1/2500 sec., handheld]

This is a very different perspective on one of the most visited sites in Yellowstone…the Falls of the Yellowstone River. I set up my tripod back from the overlook and put on the wide angle lens. Then I attached a B+W 9-stop ND (neutral density filter to slow down the exposure in order to record the motion of visitors gawking at the falls (and taking selfies!). Of course, there were a dozen people here just before I got set up, then they all vanished. Where’s the bus of Japanese tourists when you want them! [Canon 7D with Sigma 10-20mm lens and B+W 9-stop ND filter, f11 at 15 seconds, ISO 100, tripod]

Though the full moon ruined any plans we had for star trail photos, it made up for it during this moonrise at Silver Gate. The only way to get a large moon in your photos is to use a very long telephoto lens. But put an “earthbound” element into your photo to give the full moon scale. [Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/125, tripod]

If you are even remotely interested in wildlife photography, this new e-zine (electronic magazine) is a must-get purchase. Okay, I do have an article in this month’s issue (and the cover shot!), but that’s not why I’m excited about Wildlife Photographic.

Craig Orr from the U.K. has put together a slick e-zine with articles from some very big names in wildlife photography…
Allan Murphy (famed backyard songbird set up artist)
Juan Pons (Digital Photo Experience podcast)
Sparky Stensaas (Creative Winter Silhouettes)
…wait! I don’t belong in that list.

There are also very cool embedded videos, such as New Zealand wildlife photographer Chris McLennan’s video “Car-L Meets the Lions” in which he built a remote control 4wd platform to mount his camera. He then drove it near Lions in Africa…The results are funny, amazing, and not good news for the poor remote control vehicle!

“Wildlife Photographic is your bimonthly magazine dedicated to wildlife photography. Providing tips, tricks and inspiration to photographers, while enjoying the amazing beauty of wildlife across the globe.

Thanks to Apple’s amazing newsstand platform, we can feature not only great articles, but also video and interactive content as well. Viewing magazines has never been so enjoyable!

While our main focus is on photography, at Wildlife Photographic we love and respect the animals we share our planet with. With this in mind, each month we put the spotlight on different nature conservation orginizations working to preserve wildlife and their habitats.

Subscribe to Wildlife Photographic and receive a huge saving of 25% off the cover price.

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Currently this e-zine is only available through Apple’s iTunes for the iPhone and iPad.

It’s that time of year to take stock of our shooting fortunes from the year past. For me, it was a mixed bag. I wanted to do more wildlife video but didn’t find the time for much. 2013 was also the year of the “Feathered & Furry 500,” my attempt to photograph 500 species of animals in Minnesota in one year [More on this in a post in the near-future]. And I did rack up a pretty big list…including over 220 species of birds. But I was also trying to be creative in my shots….More than the usual perfect light portrait.
In the next few days I will also post more “Top Tens” from 2013…Stay tuned!
Here are my favorites in no particular order:American Crow in snowstorm. Taken near my house on the way to the gas station to get some milk for the family…The lesson? Always have your camera in the car. I really didn’t do much to the photo as the scene was already extremely contrasty. I did tweak the Levels and Curves to clip the whites and blacks in Aperture. Carlton County, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/640, ISO 160, handheld but braced on car window]

Chickadee landing on feeder at dawn. I “previsioned” this shot but just had to wait for the right morning and get up the gumption to shoot in the cold of a winter morning. I underexposed by nearly two stops in order to put the backlit wing feathers in a medium tonal range. Yes, it could have been better if part of the bird wasn’t blocked by the feeder. My house, Carlton County, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/2500 second, ISO 3200, Handheld]

European Starlings and Aerial Lift Bridge. I was photographing gulls in Duluth’s Canal Park when a large flock of starlings spooked from the bridge. I instinctively threw up my camera and started shooting. I really like the pattern and composition of this very “graphic” image, especially how the steel girders are all kind of converging in the center. The birds are nicely spaced too. Check the color version/variation below. Canal Park, Duluth, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f9 at 1/400 second, ISO 800, Handheld]

Bald Eagle Landscape. I didn’t “see” this composition when I clicked the shutter…I just pointed my lens out the window when I saw and eagle land there. Only later did I see the nice composition of vertical aspen trunks contrasting with the blueish background of distant pines. A bird-in-the-landscape shot that works. Carlton County, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/800 second, ISO 640, Handheld but braced on car window]

This is one of 3 images in this Top Ten that were taken within minutes of each other (the others were the startling/bridge silhouettes). Fortuitously, the gulls all perched in perfect locations to make this interesting silhouette. Duluth, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f18 at 1/400 second, ISO 800, Handheld]

Common Redpoll on snowy road. I laid flat on a snow-covered road to get this unique portrait of a Common Redpoll, a winter visitor to northern Minnesota. I blew out the whites to improve the high-key look of this shot. Sax-Zim Bog, Minnesota
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/1600 second, ISO 200, Handheld while laying on ground]

Two Trumpeter Swans landing. Sepia tool in Aperture really helped this shot…The color version wasn’t bad, but the colors were a bit weird. If this happens to you, try and play with black-and-white or sepia color. Mississippi River, Monticello, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/1600 second, ISO 250, Handheld]

American Crow in snowstorm Wide. Taken only seconds after the image at the top of the post but with a 10-20mm lens instead of a 400mm lens! I like the simple composition of 3 stark tree silhouettes and one bird tiny in the frame. Carlton County, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Sigma 10-20mm, f6.3 at 1/640 second, ISO 160 Handheld]

Two Sharp-tailed Grouse in Tamaracks. One of my favorite images of the year (You may certainly disagree!) But I just love the composition of the one distant bird more obvious, then the closer bird more hidden in the trees. I wish I could say I designed this shot, but it was just a “haccident” (happy accident). Sax-Zim Bog, Minnesota.
[Canon 7D with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, f5.6 at 1/1000 second, ISO 160, tripod]